"Close up, gentlemen, close up!" broke in the cheery voice of our rare
old host. "Livingstone, if you begin back-handing already, you'll never
be able to hold that great raking chestnut I saw your groom leading this
evening. The man looked as if he thought he would be eaten before he got
in."

"Whatever you do, drink fair," Guy answered, laughing; "so saith the
immortal Gamp. The squire's beginning to tremble for his '22 wine."

"I don't wonder," said Godfrey Parndon, the M.F.H. "I've always observed
that, after flirting disgracefully at dinner, you drink harder
afterward. It's to drown remorse, I suppose. So you ride that new horse
of yours to-morrow? My poor hounds!"

"Don't be alarmed," cried Guy; "he never kicks hounds, and I won't let
him go over them; it's only human strangers the amiable animal can't
endure: that's why I call him the Axeine. He is worth more than the £300
I gave for him."

"Well, he nearly spoiled two grooms for Hounscott," Parndon said. "The
stablemen at Revesby had a great beer the day they got rid of him."

"He wouldn't suit every one," remarked Livingstone--"not you, for
instance, Godfrey, who always ride with a loose rein. I was obliged to
give him his gallops myself at first; he's a devil to pull, and if he
once gets away with you, you may 'write to your friends.' But I've
nothing like him in my stable."

Then the conversation became general, revolving in a circle of
hound-and-horse talk, as it will do now and then in the shires.